The marriage of food and pop culture has one of its better moments in Pure Ketchup by Andrew F. Smith. This history proves that a book larded with hundreds of footnotes can captivate. Smith's writing is lucid and clips along briskly from one astonishing fact to the next. Did you know that ketchup was so much the rage by the early 19th century that Lord Byron, Jane Austin and Charles Dickens all mention it in their work? Or that in 1915 over 800 brands of ketchup were sold in the state of Connecticut alone? Smith elucidates the cloudy origins of both the word ("ketchup" "catchup" "catsup") and the condiment.

He documents the evolution of its commercial production in America. Enormous demand for ketchup and other tomato products, he explains, fueled the movement to rid it of adulterants and preservatives and was key to passage of the Pure Food and Drugs Bill in 1906. The fifty recipes Smith includes are all historical. Same may tempt you to try your hand despite their primitive instructions.